When John woke again, the room was dark. A thin wash of light pollution was spilling through the stained-glass window, casting red and blue and golden dapples against the floor and walls. The air was circulating gently—he could hear the quiet buzz of the HVAC working.
And there was a body curled against his side, small and delicate.
He drew in a deep breath and her scent filled the air around him. First a floral product that she used in her hair, and then her own smell underneath. Something like warm honey and wood-smoke that he would recognize anywhere.
John wondered how long she had been there. It said something about his deep state of disrepair, he thought wryly, that he hadn't woken when she settled in beside him.
Cassie was fully dressed, wearing frayed denim shorts and a close-fitting blue t-shirt. She was still resting on top of the covers, as if she had lain down for a moment and fallen asleep by accident. Her wild curls were in her face and the shirt had ridden up to expose several inches of belly. Without thinking, he wrapped his arms around her, drawing her against his chest. He buried his face in her strawberry-blonde hair and breathed in deeply.
"Fy nghariad," he murmured, the Welsh words coming easily to his lips. Although had never stopped writing in his mother tongue, he hadn't spoken it in—ages. But the freefall through time had weakened those barriers in his mind. As did those new, old memories, the ones that had been hidden and given back again, of his lost, green home…
How long had it been, since he had sung a spell? Or sung just for the pleasure of bringing a smile to a pretty girl's face? His heart twisted, and the woman in his arms shifted in her sleep.
"Pritkin," she muttered against his chest. And then her body stiffened like a board as she jolted awake.
"Shhh," he whispered. "Sleep."
But she wriggled herself out of his arms and sat up, looking around wildly.
"What time is it?" she whispered vehemently.
"It doesn't matter," he responded evenly. "It's night. You need to rest."
"I—" she looked down at him and her face softened. Then her jaw set and she tightened her lips, as always when she decided to tell him something he wouldn't like.
"No, I have to go. We—we have a problem."
"What problem?"
"It's Mircea," she said, and despite his best efforts, his fists clenched. "…he knows."
John's thoughts went immediately to all the stolen kisses, desperate measures in the back seats of cars, the temporary insanity in the Fae slave camp, and the unforgettable tumble in the launderer's tent…
His right hand settled possessively on one of her thighs.
"You don't belong to him," he replied in a voice that sounded surprisingly calm.
"That's not what I mean," she said quickly. Then she paused and rolled her eyes.
"Well, maybe that, too. But I meant—he knows about you. About who you are."
That through him for a loop. He opened his mouth to issue any number of retorts, and then closed it again. No, however much he despised that smooth-talking creature, Mircea was not stupid.
"He saw me in Paris, when you two were after the Codex."
"And when I was fighting the Spartoi, when you gave me energy…" Cassie continued. "But I think it must have clicked while you were gone—the Demon Council joined our alliance. Adra's been talking to the Senate on his own, and Casanova and Rian were involved, and since Rian's made her own body now…"
She trailed off with a heavy sigh and hung her head. John reached out his other hand and tilted her chin up, then softly cupped her face.
"Cassie." She looked back at him and he saw fear in her eyes. It hurt his heart. "You have risked your life time and time again to save mine. It's not your job to preserve my secret identity after I've shot so many holes in it myself."
She stared at him for a beat.
"Did you just make a superhero joke?" she asked incredulously.
"It just slipped out," he said apologetically.
He was silent a moment.
"Stay here with me. We can figure it out together. Tomorrow."
Because he knew her so well, he could see her arguing with herself, feel her body tense up like an animal about to flee. But she didn't run or shift.
She kissed him, lips crashing down on his own with no subtlety whatsoever. He responded fiercely, nipping her lower lip, and she sprawled across his body, running her hands through his hair before they wandered down to his shoulders and stroked his chest.
He felt a pang of self-consciousness and pulled back from her reluctantly.
"Cassie, I haven't had a shower in who knows how long…"
She made a little disappointed noise that had him twitching. Then the tiniest smile crossed her face.
"Want a bath?" she asked.
"Will you scrub my back?" John countered. Her smile got a little bigger and bloody hell, she doesn't know what that does to me.
She slid off him and stood next to the bed, holding out a hand.
"Sit up."
He obeyed her and reached out his arm. With no warning, he was sitting on the cold floor of his own bathroom, leaning against the tiled side of the deep tub he never used. Cassie was bending over, turning the taps on and pouring lavender-scented liquid into the basin.
"You've been working on your precision shifts," he commented, trying to ignore the ridiculousness of his position. And watching her butt wiggle back and forth as she moved.
"I've had my share of adventures lately," she replied. She looked down at him and the tiny smile was still there. "How are your legs?"
"Only one way to find out." John braced his hands against the floor and swung his legs underneath him, pushing up. His muscles protested as if he had run a half marathon, and once standing, he swayed a little on his feet. But he was upright. That little thread of power had done its work.
"Don't push yourself too far, ok?" Cassie's arms were around his waist and a couple of fingers had crept down the back of his waistband, caressing that spot on his lower back that she could never leave alone. He shivered and the frisson of pleasure traveled down his body to his groin, where his erection was no doubt becoming obvious against the loose fabric of his sweatpants.
That little smile was driving him crazy.
Steam was beginning to waft around them and Cassie reached over to shut off the water faucet. The surface of the water was obscured by a thick film of bubbles. John had never taken a bubble bath in his life, but this didn't seem like the moment to complain.
"Take off your shirt," Cassie ordered, placing her hands on her hips. John stifled a grin and peeled off his t-shirt. He let it drop to the floor and watched her lick her lips.
"And your pants."
He pushed the waistband down his hips, over that one obstacle that was giving him trouble, and they pooled softly around his ankles. Cassie cleared her throat and a blush spread across her cheeks.
"Is the water ready?" he asked in a mild tone.
"Yes," she replied, a little breathlessly.
John paused and looked over at the bathtub. He thought about swinging one leg over the edge and then the other. He envisioned himself slipping and falling on his face, resulting in embarrassment and grievous injury. Discretion, he told himself, is the better part of valor.
Instead, he sat down on the edge of the tub and slowly maneuvered his body over the lip and into the basin. The warm water felt like heaven and he groaned as he slid in to his shoulders.
He looked over just in time to see Cassie shimmying out of her little denim shorts. When they hit the ground, she was already pulling the t-shirt over her head. Maybe he was focusing too hard on the perfect breasts straining against her lacy purple bra, because the next thing he knew, she was on her knees in the water, straddling him, with a bar of soap in one hand and a washcloth in the other.
Perhaps I have died, he thought wildly, and this is my reward for good behavior.
He must have said it aloud, because she responded in kind.
"No," she murmured, "I think this is my reward."
And she started running the soapy washcloth over the muscles of his neck and shoulders, and then underwater along his pecs and the ridges of his abs. She didn't stop when she reached his hips. Ever so gently, she rubbed the soft cloth across his groin, squeezing a bit harder than necessary down the length of him, and then moved to his thighs. He made a desperate little sound in the back of his throat as she touched him, and he resolved to replace that infuriating little smile she still wore.
His fingers were already working better than earlier in the day, because he unhooked her bra in no time at all and threw it across the bathroom. He grasped her around the ribs—she's light as a bird, damnit—and pulled those pert pink nipples toward him, so he could suck them into his mouth one at a time.
Now she was making desperate little noises and the wild stab of joy through his heart was almost more than he could bear. He slid his hands down to the swell of her hips and ever-so-softly thrust himself upward, just barely grazing her core and making her whimper as he pulled away. She was balancing herself with her hands on his shoulders, so he walked his fingers down between her legs while he used his lips to nip at her breasts. A caress earned him a sigh, and tentative pressure produced a squeal that almost broke his resolve. He muttered a spell under his breath and her soaked underwear disappeared. Soon his fingers found a comfortable rhythm and she buried her face in the crook of his neck, moving her hips against his touch.
John was so absorbed in his task that he didn't feel her hands disappear from his chest, until one reached between his legs and took his shaft in a soft grip. He inhaled sharply and froze when she brushed a thumb over a particularly delicate spot at the tip. And then she shifted her hips from his grasp and thrust downward, sliding all of him inside her in one smooth plunge.
"Unh," she moaned, and for one long second, John wasn't sure he was going to last. She ground herself against him and then withdrew a few inches, only to drop back down and do it all over again.
"Cassie," he began, not entirely sure what he was going to say, but she stopped up his mouth with her own and he drank her down. His incubus awoke, but it was sleepy and complacent—it took a few lazy sips of power and magnified them into gentle swirls that glided along her skin like puffs of smoke. He slid his hands up and down her body as she rode him, to her breasts, then her waist, the swell of her hips and the tantalizing curve of her ass, before focusing on that sensitive nub at the crux of her legs. She cried out again when he touched her, something that might have been his name, and he grinned fiercely in satisfaction as her thrusts became ragged. Her orgasm came suddenly, with a long, shuddering sigh, and he was taken by surprise when the clenching muscles around his length triggered an equal reaction in him.
John felt like he was melting, that his body was nothing but warm water and lightning and a sense of relief that was more than physical. When the lightning dissipated and only the languor remained, he enveloped her in his arms. He whispered nonsense into her wet curls and her soft jawline, a mixture of old Welsh and English and Fey tongues that was surely indecipherable to anyone but him.
"Don't ever leave again," she said, very quietly, against his chest.
"Never again," he replied. "As long as it is in my power."
She tilted her head upward and he looked down at her face. Her blue eyes were wide and bright.
"Do you understand why?"
John wet his lips.
"Because you love me," he said hesitantly. "And I love you."
"Damn straight," she said vehemently, and he smiled at her even though his eyes felt suspiciously wet.
Perhaps peace would be fleeting, but for now, it felt like absolution.
.
...
.
Later—after she insisted on washing his hair—Cassie drained the water from the bathtub and shifted them both back to his bed. They were still naked and damp, but she pulled up the covers around them into a cozy nest.
"I shifted here because I missed you," she said, almost sheepishly, after they were wrapped in the blankets. "I was just going to check on you. I didn't mean to fall asleep. Or to jump you."
"You can jump me," John replied absently. His eyelids were growing heavy. Was sex always like this? Or was it weakness from his recovery? It had been so long that he hardly remembered.
How pleasant, to fall asleep with warm, bare skin along his own. That scent, like warm honey. Soft hair falling against his chest.
"Pritkin?"
"Mmhmm?"
"I think we're out of coffee and the main drag is closed."
"'salright," he muttered, squeezing her hip.
"Pritkin?"
Yes? he thought, but only a sigh came from his mouth.
"…has anyone every told you that you have a pretty dick?"
But he was asleep.
